"And our young doctor-in-training? He based this helpful conclusion on what precisely?"

"The size of the wound for the first part, and then the lack of obvious fraying around the edges of the wound. You see, a slash produces a different appearance to even the semi trained and partially educated eye than a stab."

"And a first-year medical student saw this?"

Hugh grinned again, punctuating his reply with a quick laugh.

"A most interesting medical student. With a most unique background."

Pryce was also smiling.

"Tell him, Hugh. This is delicious, Tommy. Simply delicious. A fact that tastes nearly as good as a large slice of rare roast beef and a generous dollop of Yorkshire pudding."

"Okay. Sounds good. Shoot."

"Our mortuary man did all the gangster funerals in Cleveland.

Everyone killed by the local mobs. Every last one. And they apparently had a bit of prewar trouble between competing, ah, interests in that fine city. Our soon-to-be doctor laid out the bodies of at least three men with their necks cut in the precise same way, and curious lad that he is, he asked his uncle about it. And his uncle conveniently explained that no professional killer would ever just slash a man's throat. No sir. Far too bloody. Far too messy. And difficult. And oftentimes the poor bastard with the neck laid open has just enough energy remaining to pull out one of those quite large thirty-eight-caliber pistols that the gangsters seem to favor and squeeze off a few shots, which, of course, is awkward for the assassin trying to exit, stage left. So they use a different technique. A long-bladed stiletto punched upward, as I demonstrated. Slices the vocal cords on the way to the brain so the only sound you hear perhaps is a little gurgle, twist it around once or twice to mess up the gray matter, and the man drops to the floor dead. Very dead. And it's neat. Hardly any blood at all. Do it just right, and the only risk you have to yourself is fraying your shirt as the blade passes over the arm that lifts the victim off the floor."

"And obviously," Tommy said eagerly, "the wound is delivered…"

Hugh finished the sentence for him,"… from behind. Not in front. In other words…"

Tommy stepped in,"… an assassination and not a fight. A sneak-attack, not a confrontation. With a stiletto. Interesting."

"Precisely," Hugh said, with a small laugh.

"Good news, as I said. Lincoln Scott may be many things, but he doesn't seem like some sort of lurking back-stabber."

Pryce nodded, listening.

"And there's one other rather intriguing aspect of this style of killing."

"What's that?" Tommy asked.

"It is the exact same method of silencing a man that is taught by His Majesty's Commando Brigades. Neat. Quiet.

Effective. Fast. And, by extrapolation, perhaps taught by your

American counterparts in the Rangers. Or elsewhere in your more clandestine services."

"How do you know that, Phillip?"

The older man hesitated before replying.

"I'm afraid I have some education in commando techniques."

Tommy stopped, staring at the frail barrister.

"Phillip, I can't really see you as a commando." He laughed as he spoke, but when Pryce turned toward him, the laugh faded, for he saw his friend's face had fallen, graying even in the sunlight, stricken with a hurt that seemed to reverberate from deep within.

"Not me," Pryce said, choking slightly.

"My son."

"You have a son?" Tommy asked.

"Phillip," Hugh chimed in, "you never said anything-" Pryce raised his hand to stop the other men's questions. For an instant the older man seemed so pale that he was almost translucent. His skin had turned a pasty, fish like color. At the same time, he took a step toward them, but he staggered as he came forward, and both Tommy and Hugh reached out, as if to grasp him. Again he held up his hand, and then, abruptly, Pryce simply sat down in the dust of the perimeter path. He looked up sorrowfully at the two fliers, and said slowly, painfully,

"My dear boys. Dear Tommy and Hugh. I'm sorry.

I had a son. Phillip Junior."

Tears were pushing at the crinkled edges of the wing commander's eyes.

His voice seemed like leather cracking under tension. Between the tears that started to slide down his cheeks, Pryce smiled, as if this great sadness within him was also, oddly, amusing.

"I suppose, Hugh, he's the reason I'm here, now" Hugh bent over toward his friend.

"Phillip, please…"

Pryce shook his head.

"No, no. Jolly well should have told you lads the truth months ago.

But kept it all bottled up, you know. Stiff upper lip. Carry on and all that. Didn't want to be more of a burden than I already am…"

"You're not a burden," Tommy said. He and Hugh dropped to the ground and sat next to their friend, who started to speak as his eyes traveled beyond the wire, out toward the world beyond.

"Well, my Elizabeth died at the start of the Blitz. I'd asked her to go to the country, but she was stubborn. Delightfully so, you know, truly that was why I loved her. She was fearless and she wasn't for a moment going to allow some little Austrian corporal to run her out of her home, no matter how many damn bombers he sent over. So I told her when the sirens sounded, to make her way to the underground, but she sometimes preferred to sit out the raids in the basement.

The house took a five-hundred-pounder straight on. At least she didn't suffer…"

"Phillip, you don't have to…" Hugh said, but the older man simply smiled and shook his head.

"So then there was just Phillip Junior and myself. And he'd already enlisted, you see. Nineteen years old, and a commissioned officer in the Black Watch. All kilts and pipes swirling with that screeching noise that the Scots call music, claymores, and tradition. His mother, you see, she was a Scot, and I think he thought he owed it to her. The Black Watch, Clan Fergus, and Clan McDiarmid. Hard men all. They were trained as commandos, fought at Dieppe and St. Nazaire, and Phillip Junior would come home on leave and show me some of the more exotic techniques he'd been educated with, including how to silence a sentry which was precisely what we've run into here. He used to say that their instructor, this wiry little red-haired Scot you could hardly understand his brogue was so thick, would always end his lectures on killing with the phrase: "Gentlemen, remember: Always be neat."

Phillip Junior loved that.

"Be neat," he'd say, as I cut us some beef for dinner. And then he'd laugh. Great laughter, boys. He had a huge, unrestricted bellow of a laugh. It would simply stir up like a volcano and burst forth. He loved to laugh. Playing rugger during his public school days, he'd be grinning and laughing even with blood dripping from his nose. I thought when his mother was killed that he would no longer take such joy in life, but even with that sadness weighing on him, he was still irrepressible. He loved every breath he took. Delighted in it. And he, in turn, was loved. Not just by me, his dull and doting dad, of course, but by his chums at school, and all the young ladies at socials, and then by the men he commanded, because all of them knew him to be guileless and brilliant and dependable. A child becoming a man.

He seemed to grow larger with every minute, and I was in awe of what the world held out for him."

Pryce took a deep breath.

"They had a rule, you know, in the commandos. Behind Kraut lines, if you were wounded, you were left behind. A nasty rule, that. But essential, I suppose. The group is always more important than the individual. The target and the assignment are more important than any one man. Any one life."

Pryce choked on the words.

"But you know," he continued, "that simply wasn't my boy's style. No.

Not Phillip Junior. Too loyal, I suppose. A friend would never abandon a friend, no matter how awful things appeared, and that's what he was. A friend to all."